


Piece of Cake

by EleenaDume, tiredandjaded (CallingVersatile)



Category: The Owl House (Cartoon)
Genre: Aged-Up Characters, Bakery AU?? Kind of??, F/F, Future Fic, Meet-Cute but it's a reunion after 10 years, Or something more??? ;), Reconnecting Friendships
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-09
Updated: 2021-03-09
Packaged: 2021-03-16 20:41:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,744
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29955585
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EleenaDume/pseuds/EleenaDume, https://archiveofourown.org/users/CallingVersatile/pseuds/tiredandjaded
Summary: After a short but successful Grudgby career in her early 20's, Boscha has settled down into a life of more comfortable anonymity running a bakery. It's not what she would have expected to find herself doing, but it's satisfying work, even if it is a bit lonely. She hasn't thought about Skara (much, anyway) in years, but a late pickup for a birthday cake might be the chance encounter Boscha needs to bring some music back into her life.
Relationships: Boscha/Skara (The Owl House)
Comments: 7
Kudos: 54





	Piece of Cake

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Lexa_Alycia](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lexa_Alycia/gifts).



> happy birthday, Em! thanks for being a great friend and a wonderful Em-press. this was mostly Anna's doing, but ended up being a collaboration to bring it home in time. Hopefully I made it!

It was a calm afternoon in the bakery—as most Thursday afternoons were. At a time when the majority of witches were still at work or at school, the modest, one floor shop nestled between the brewery and the convenience store was easily overlooked.

Boscha didn’t mind the afternoon slowdown. It served as a nice breather, and gave her time to get some of the week’s cake orders out of the way. She could take a lengthy lunch break whenever the hell she wanted without it being an inconvenience, and still have about an hour or two to enchant some of the moving decorations her shop was known for. Only occasionally was her work interrupted by the scream of the bell that announced a new customer—usually someone stopping by to pick up an order.

Later in the day, the traffic would pick up again, as people were let out of work or school, hungry for a snack, or some forgetful fool (there was always at least one) suddenly remembered their wedding anniversary at six in the evening.

It would have been enough to just open in the morning and the evening, like she usually did, but it was convenient to have two days a week where the shop was open for most of the day. She was there anyway. Couldn’t hurt to snag a few more potential customers.

On this particular afternoon, Boscha was just finishing up the decoration she’d been working on when the bell startled her out of her concentration, causing her to mess up the tiny blinking eye she’d been making. 

Needless to say, she wasn’t in the greatest of moods as she got up and headed to the storefront half of the bakery.

Boscha didn’t consider herself easily startled, but it had been a full two hours since the last sale. Assuming she wouldn’t see any more customers before the evening rush, she had allowed herself to become fully absorbed in finishing the decorations for the kid’s birthday cake that would be picked up on Saturday.

And of course, the _one time_ she allowed herself to be focused for half an hour, some dumbass had to waltz in here and—

_‘No way.’_

Boscha’s mounting frustration dissolved in an instant, swallowed up by utter disbelief. The snarky comment about how unnecessary and rude it had been to ring the bell a third time died in her throat, and she instead found herself staring, completely lost for words.

The customer placed a receipt on the counter.

“I know this order was supposed to be picked up yesterday, but Dorian couldn’t make it like he promised, and we couldn’t exactly make Cady pick up the cake for her own surprise party. So yeah, uh, could I please get-” Gray eyes met blue for the first time since the other woman had stepped into the bakery—no, for the first time in _years_. _“Boscha?”_

“Skara?”

Boscha blinked a few times, trying to reconcile the image of her childhood friend with the woman now standing in her store. Skara looked different now. Gone was the tight ponytail that had kept her white curls in check when she’d been a teen—she still dyed them, but they were loose now, framing her face and spilling down past her shoulders.

The band shirt she was wearing—Boscha didn’t recognize the name, probably some group that was more popular near the pelvis, where Skara lived now—looked like it had seen better days. 

_‘Likely one the dork got signed at a concert and that she then wears for the next ten years,’_ Boscha thought to herself.

Yeah, that sounded like Skara. At least like the one Boscha had known what felt like a lifetime ago.

“We’ll stay in touch” was a promise almost as easily made as it was broken when someone moved out of town. Slowly, calls had turned into texts, which had then gotten less and less frequent, until eventually, somewhere between a changed scroll number and two busy lives, contact had broken off altogether.

Boscha suddenly became painfully aware of the bone meal dusting the front of her apron— she usually dusted herself off with a quick spell before dealing with a customer, but in her fit of childish annoyance she’d neglected to do so.

...so really, she had no one but herself to blame.

This was not how Boscha had imagined their reunion going—not that it was something she imagined frequently. It wasn’t like she’d forgotten about Skara or anything (as if she’d ever be able to, even if she tried), but she hadn’t exactly gotten her hopes up about seeing her again. It had been years; people grew apart. That was life.

But, well... life also had a funny way of proving one wrong.

“So, uh, I kinda own a bakery now?”

“I... can see that.” Skara blinked at her, extremely confused. “No offense, but this is not how I imagined you spending your thirties.”

Boscha raised an eyebrow.

“You’ve been imagining how I spend my thirties?”

Skara snorted.

“Good to know you haven’t changed in the slightest.” She shook her head… fondly? Boscha hoped it was fond. “Still, care to tell a girl how a former professional Grudgby player ended up in a place like this?”

“Okay, so, for the record, this wasn’t how I used to imagine my thirties either,” Boscha admitted. “Not that I imagined my thirties much, ever, because like—me, acknowledging that I’m gonna get old? Hell no.” Skara chuckled. “But also... it’s really uncommon for anyone to play professionally for more than a couple of years, since it does a number on your health.”

“I knew that, but, I mean... a bakery?” Skara raised an eyebrow at her. “Really?”

“Well, after I was done playing Grudgby, I spent a couple of weeks just doing stuff like reading and catching up on orb shows I’d neglected in favor of training before. But I got bored of that after a while, so I decided to try a new hobby.” Boscha shrugged. “Knitting turned out to not really be my thing, and I’ve never been a painting or gardening person—I mean, we both know I kill pretty much any plant I come into contact with.”

Skara snorted.

“Yeah, true. I mean, I’ve seen you kill cacti before because you kept forgetting to water them. That was madly impressive.”

 _‘Oh great, she remembers that.’_ Boscha was still kind of embarrassed about that particular incident, since it said a lot about her general carelessness, but it was her own fault for bringing it up. “Anyway, after a bit of trial and error, I settled on baking, and well... here we are.”

Skara looked at her like she still didn’t quite believe her and was half expecting all this to be some kind of weird, elaborate joke.

“Where's the spectacle? The challenge of competition, the glory of victory and all that?”

Boscha found that suddenly, the lamp she’d bought for the bakery about a year ago was the most interesting sight in the room. She sighed.

It was a fair question to ask, especially for someone like Skara, who had known that part of Boscha best—the girl obsessed with always being the best, who had butted heads with anyone that had dared to oppose her and whose idea of glory and fun had been to set Luz’s locker on fire during a free period, just because she could.

That wasn’t exactly a part of her life she looked back on with pride. Boscha didn’t make excuses for her past behavior, but it wasn’t something she liked to dwell on, either. Still, for some reason, she felt the urge to explain herself. 

Eventually, she shrugged, still not quite able to find it in herself to look at Skara again as she spoke. “I dunno. I guess glory never really did that much for me, in the end.”

The sentence hung in the air between them, a fragile admission, heavy with intent. They were words you couldn’t have _beaten_ out of the brash, prideful girl Skara had known, and Boscha offered them with a quiet sincerity as breathtaking as it was unexpected. 

She may have had the same pink hair Skara could recognize across a crowded street, that ridiculous power-walk that bordered on stomping, even the same athletic build, the hard set of her shoulders and distractingly toned arms, but Skara suddenly felt like a clever illusion had just been dispelled right before her eyes. This really wasn't the same Boscha she once knew, was it?

She watched on intently as Boscha’s eyes wandered from the lamp to the bakery display, a small smile forming on her lips as she spoke.

“Baking is... kinda like potions, actually. It reminded me why I liked that track, beneath all the ‘crushing my enemies’ stuff. There's something about taking simple ingredients and your own two hands and making something new. I’ve... always liked that.” She looked from shelf to pastry dome to display case, each filled with cakes and pastries, ranging from simple turnovers to elaborate lattice-topped pies. The fact that she’d made all those with her own two hands made her heart swell with pride. “In potions class, it was about making a strength draught, or acid, or an invisibility brew or whatever. And that's fine, I was good at it. But when someone comes to pick up a wedding cake, or a surprise for their kids, or even just something to pick themselves up if they're feeling down... it's like taking those simple ingredients and making a memory. Something real, something good in someone’s life, even if they don't remember me for it.”

“Holy shit, you really love this, huh?”

Skara’s soft whisper abruptly snapped Boscha out of her reverie and forced her to confront the very embarrassing reality that she’d just bared her soul to someone she hadn’t seen in almost a decade, in the form of _baking of all things._

“I-” Boscha cleared her throat awkwardly, her face burning with heat, and a part of her really wished for that invisibility brew she’d just talked about. But going back on what she’d just said wouldn’t have been very believable, so she had no choice but to adhere to it. “You could say so, yeah!” 

Squeaky voice! Great! Just what she’d needed right now! 

_‘Titan please just strike me dead right where I stand...’_

"Wow. That’s…” Skara trailed off, and Boscha had to resist the urge to groan, certain that if she looked over, she would be met with a look of confusion or pity—the Beast of the Banshees, reduced to rambling about baking. “You know what? You should come."

“I—what?” 

The sudden change in subject was enough to make Boscha’s head spin, enough for her to completely forget her mission of ‘stare straight at the wall to avoid eternal shame.’ She couldn’t have meant… Yet when she turned to Skara, two eyes wide in confusion, the third in a quizzical frown, she got the feeling it might have been just as unexpected to her old friend as it was to her.

It was now Skara’s turn to stammer awkwardly, it seemed. She looked like someone had swiped the script out of her hands during a practice run and left her to monologue on her own—only now she was being asked to explain what she had just come up with on the spot. 

Despite her own curiosity, Boscha couldn’t help the slight smile that tugged at the corners of her mouth. It looked like for all the both of them may have changed, in some ways, Skara was still the same girl Boscha had known and… 

She was saved from finishing _that_ particular thought by Skara suddenly regaining the ability to speak. 

“To the party!” she exclaimed, just a bit too loud in the empty storefront. “That the cake is for. That’s what you should come to, I mean. It's, um-”

Some long-buried memory clicked into place in Boscha’s mind, and she found herself nodding along in understanding. 

“Cady’s birthday, right? I remember now.” 

Skara blinked at her in surprise. 

“Um—yeah, that’s right. We’re throwing a whole surprise party and everything. Well, I say ‘we,’ but her girlfriend organized most of this. My siblings offered to help, but of course Dorian got his schedule all criss-crossed again and now June is freaking out because she really wants to propose today and everything has to be perfect for that.”

 _‘Ah. That’s probably what Skara is in town for, then.’_ That made a lot of sense. “So... exciting day for your family, huh?”

Skara grinned.

“You bet! That said, there’s a little part of me that can’t believe my little sis is gonna get married and I’m still single.” She rolled her eyes towards the heavens with an accompanying tilt to her head, a gesture that was so classically _Skara_ it made the baker’s chest ache with a note of nostalgia, all fresh cut grass and Grudgby cleats on linoleum tiles and improvised harpsichord floating out into the hallway while Boscha scribbled away at Potions homework. “Never gonna hear the end of that one, I swear.”

“Ooof, yeah, that’s super awkward,” Boscha said, shaking her head in sympathy to cover up the stupid, hopeful lurch her heart gave at the words ‘I’m still single.’ She was _not_ getting her hopes up, because that would have implied there was something to hope for. Which there wasn’t. “My parents get annoying enough about me finding a partner just because my sister is in a steady relationship. I don’t even want to imagine how much worse that would get if they got married.”

Alright. Great! Now Boscha had successfully and subtly established that she was also single. Just… to have something to relate to Skara over, of course. 

“Obviously nobody is gonna bother Reed with this stuff since he’s aro-ace, so it’s just me, then Cady, and then the twins. And since Dorian and Canto are the babies of the family and even at age eighteen, my moms still kind of dread either of them finding a partner, me being single is gonna be the talk of the mansion today—aside from the actual engagement, obviously.” Skara rolled her eyes. “I love my family, but they are a _pain_ when it comes to me finding a date. Watch them try to set me up with someone at my little sister’s engagement. Wouldn’t be the first time they pulled something like that.”

Boscha snorted. Looked like their families still had _that_ in common. 

“Ugh, tell me about it,” she griped. “Like... I’m an adult? Let me pick my own relationships to fail, please?”

Skara spluttered with laughter—not the dainty giggle that could disarm a rampaging troll, or even the knowing, conspiratorial chuckle that allowed her to get on anyone's good side, but the kind of unplanned, undignified laughter that made Boscha think of late night scroll calls and post-game celebrations.

“No, no, that's exactly it!” Skara said, her voice bubbling with mirth. “Like, hello, maybe I want to choose who I'm getting stood up by?” Boscha snorted and cracked a smile, which was apparently enough to convince Skara to keep going. “It's _my_ date and _I_ get to choose who I sob into a bowl of frozen screams over!” 

Boscha was grinning now, a warmth flooding through her chest like she hadn’t felt in years as she tried (and failed) to contain a chuckle. Unfortunately—or fortunately, because this was Skara and she was _here_ and how could that be anything but—it seemed that her old friend still remembered exactly how to turn Boscha into an undignified heap of laughter. Her volume rose, a theatrical energy overtaking her as she gestured wildly at nothing in particular. 

“If I wanna get Gorgon Blood drunk over some jackass, at least let me pick the person! Like, is it _your_ hair I impulsively cut off after the breakup?”

Boscha was wheezing, waving one of her hands in front of her face. 

“Stop, stop, Skar, you're gonna kill me!”

She had tears in her eyes, a stitch in her side from laughing so hard, and for a moment she was a dumb fourteen year old again, sitting on some stupidly uncomfortable lunch room bench and cackling like a maniac because nobody, not even Boscha herself, could ever match Skara‘s razor-sharp wit.

Skara beamed at her.

“Sorry, sorry, please don’t die,” she said, though her apology was undercut by the occasional giggle. “My sister’s getting engaged today, remember? That would be really bad timing for a murder charge. It would totally,” she winked conspiratorially, “kill the mood.”

“I can’t-“ Boscha let out another insanely loud chuckle, putting a hand on her chest right above her bile sack, as she desperately tried to fill her lungs with air again “I can’t breathe!”

 _‘I love making her laugh,’_ Skara thought. 

She always had.

In their high school days, Boscha had only ever laughed at people, and she’d been more annoyed than amused when Cat or Amelia had tried to crack a joke. 

Skara had always been the only one Boscha had laughed _with_ instead of _at._ It had been a rare sight for her to be genuinely amused at anything, and Skara had always adored seeing that different side of her friend. It was like she held the key to some secret box, one that nobody but her was able to unlock.

The feeling still held all the same magic it had back then.

“You got a bit rusty, huh?” Skara raised an eyebrow. “Does nobody around here except me have a sense of humor? I don’t think I ever got this close to giving you mouth-to-mouth when we were still in school.”

Despite her increasingly breathless laughter, this was the first time during their chat that Boscha actually thought she might pass out. _That_ was new; she was pretty sure that if Skara had made those kinds of jokes around her in high school, Boscha wouldn’t have survived to graduation. She desperately hoped the flush of her cheeks would be passed off as a result of her laughter as she grappled for a response. 

“Well, you know—no one ‘round here’s as sharp as you, Skar. Can’t blame me for getting a little dull.” 

_‘What the hell was that?’_ Boscha had been going for ‘casual deflection,’ not… way too close to honest admission of how much she had missed the other girl. Maybe she _was_ getting dull.

“Now when did you get so charming, Stryder?” 

There was something in her voice, a subtle hint of… probably nothing. Boscha hadn’t heard her friend in years, what the hell did she know about what Skara sounded like? 

“Oh, you know. The measuring cups and mixing bowls make for great conversational partners.” 

Actually, Boscha had no clue what in the Titan’s name she was saying. The words were flowing out like she’d stomped on a frosting tube, but… hell, it was kinda nice. She talked with customers all the time, of course—it was part of the job, one she had resented at first but come to appreciate—but how long had it been since she’d had this kind of back-and-forth with someone who really _got_ her? 

“See! C’mon, what do you say—come with me, at least just to make sure the cake gets delivered properly.” Skara winked at her. “And maybe you could... stick around for a bit after? It’s been a while since we’ve seen each other. I feel like we have a lot to catch up on.”

Boscha sighed. Just like that, all the obstacles between them that had seemed to disappear the moment she heard her friend’s laugh slammed back into place.

“I don’t know, Skara. I still have a shift to finish.” Technically, she didn’t—it wasn’t like she actually had to work here, at all. Baking was more a hobby than anything. Her Grudgby career had raked in enough snails to last her comfortably for the next two lifetimes, even if her family name wasn’t worth a fortune by itself. “Besides, don’t you think that’s going to be, y’know, awkward?”

Skara raised an eyebrow.

“You’re acting all mushy and weird. That’s exactly why you have to come. I have to make sure you’re not some shapeshifter that took over my best friend’s life.” She fixed Boscha with a look eerily reminiscent of the one she would use to talk her into just about anything in high school—huge, sparkling eyes, ears wiggling with enthusiasm, the tiniest nervous bite of her lip that Boscha had to tear her eyes away from. “Please?”

 _‘Curse your stupid cute face,’_ Boscha thought, rolling her eyes as she stepped out from behind the counter. She didn’t know why she even bothered trying to resist—she couldn’t say no to Skara ten years ago, why would she be able to now? 

“Alright, I’m coming with you. But only because I don’t trust you around my cake. No promises on sticking around after the delivery.”

“Yessss!”

Boscha stumbled, coming perilously close to being bowled over by the impromptu hug that followed—one would think that ten years apart, as well as integration into “proper society” would have done something to temper Skara’s tendency to launch herself at her friends, but Boscha apparently just wasn’t meant to survive this day. 

“I can’t breathe, woman,” she protested, silently cursing herself because the token complaint was a lot less convincing since, one, she’d waited way too long, and two, her voice sounded way too fond for it to actually sound like protest.

“Alright, alright,” Skara chuckled, slowly letting go of her high school best friend. If she noticed the bone meal that now dusted the front of her skirt, she didn’t mention it. “You coming?”

Boscha sighed, but she changed out of her apron and got ready to close down the bakery for today. Despite all her protesting, she didn’t really believe in coming back here after she’d delivered the cake.

...she honestly didn’t even _want to._

Skara was already halfway out the door when Boscha cleared her throat.

“Skara?”

She turned around.

“Yeah?”

Boscha gestured towards the counter, one eyebrow raised in a look that would have conveyed annoyance to anyone but the woman who had nearly left her shop empty handed.

“Cake?”

That she’d almost forgotten the very thing she’d come here for was _so very Skara._

In their high school days, the only thing that had kept that girl from leaving her head at home in the morning was that it was attached to the rest of her body. There was regular forgetful, and there was Skara-forgetful—always so lost in the next lyrics she was writing that nothing else seemed to have space in her head.

It was kinda cute how much she got into her song writing, into whatever story she wanted to tell next—

_‘Dumb. It’s totally dumb.’_

Almost as dumb as the fact that _apparently,_ Boscha had never entirely gotten over that stupid crush she’d developed in their last year of high school.

After almost ten years and a handful of relationships, none of which had lasted terribly long, Skara could just waltz in here with her adorable, perfect smile and flip Boscha’s world on its head all over again.

She still laughed in that same adorable way that almost sounded like music—and maybe it was, Bard Coven and all—and it was so, so incredibly stupid that that was all it took for Boscha to crack the widest smile she’d shown anyone in months.

“Right! I should probably take the cake with me as well, people might complain if I only bring the baker.”

Boscha chuckled, carefully lifting the box that contained the cake that she’d spent five hours preparing, making sure to keep it level to prevent it from sliding around as she presented it to Skara.

“You think?”

Skara’s carriage was waiting outside. It was the very same one her parents had bought her for her eighteenth birthday after she’d earned her license, albeit with a new paint job and a wide assortment of obnoxiously colorful decorations that looked like they’d been painted on by little kids (knowing Skara, they probably had been—most likely her younger brothers, added in their youth and preserved by Skara throughout the years, either out of nostalgia or a petty sibling desire to embarrass her now-grown siblings with proof of their childish antics).

The scolopendra that Skara had named Arietta, _because of course she had,_ and that had bit Boscha at one point—stupid beast—happily extended its antennas and clicked its mandibles when Skara walked towards it to pat the shiny chitin carapace of its head.

“You might want to put the cake into the carriage first. I don’t think it would be good for the animal or the cake if Arietta got it between her fangs.”

Skara rolled her eyes.

“Ari knows not to eat cake. She’s a very well-behaved scolopendra.”

She definitely hadn’t been when Boscha had last seen her, and she somehow highly doubted that had changed in the meantime. If she’d learned anything in her time as a baker, it was that food and _any_ animal, no matter how well-behaved, didn’t mix very well, and that fact had resulted in her staying at a household to bake a new cake more than one time.

...at least she’d gotten to charge Luz and Amity extra. 

Right now, Boscha was not really in the mood for baking an entirely new cake, so she gently took it from Skara and put it inside the carriage.

“Awww, so nice of you to carry it for me,” Skara teased. “And I didn’t even have to ask.”

“Yeah, yeah, whatever.” Boscha glanced at her watch. “If you spend any more time cuddling with your demon we’re going to be late.”

“...oh right, we have places to be.”

Skara climbed into the carriage next to Boscha, pushing the food rod outside the front window and aimed it towards the left. The scolopendra started moving almost immediately.

Boscha was tempted to ask if Skara had ever been late for work due to her petting endeavors and general forgetfulness, but bit the jab back. Sometimes she still struggled to tell what crossed the line between sassy but friendly teasing and actually hurtful, and she definitely didn’t want Skara’s first impression of her in forever to be Boscha acting like a dick.

It was better not to risk it.

Boscha chewed on the silence as Skara drove them through the streets of Bonesborough, maneuvering gracefully around the occasional other carriage or large pedestrian. Her control over the vehicle had vastly improved since the last carriage ride they’d taken together—which wasn’t a surprise, considering just how long that had been.

How had they just completely lost contact like that for so many years?

 _‘Different worlds, I guess.’_ Grudgby had never been Skara’s life, not like it was for Boscha. She distinctly remembers their friendship taking a backseat to her career, months between calls stretching out until the distance between them was easier to skirt around than attempt to broach. 

Boscha had never been good at reaching out. 

“So, on why you should stick around for the party…”

Skara was still keeping an eye on the road (another way her driving skills had improved since their youth) but Boscha startled nonetheless.

“Don’t tell me you’re serious about that,” she scoffed, ignoring the little glow of warmth that flickered in her chest at the idea that Skara _wanted_ her there. It couldn’t be that easy, could it?

“Of course I am! Come on, why not?”

And just like that, all the ‘why not’s came flooding back to Boscha’s mind. There was a reason she had all but disappeared from public life. Those who had known her in passing, through Hexside or more likely her Grudgby career, would know either the queen bee bully, or the arrogant, fame-seeking captain who had famously little respect for her opponents. Neither were pictures of herself Boscha was proud to have painted. Thinking back on those days just made her wonder what the hell she had been so desperate to prove.

Unfortunately, those who knew her more personally from those days didn’t exactly have a better picture of her… the Harper family included.

“Because it’ll probably be super awkward?” Boscha said, trying not to sound annoyed. Skara was smart, there was no way she couldn’t put two and two together.

“My family’s known you forever, how’s that awkward?” 

Boscha grimaced. 

“Yeah, that’s my point. I don’t know if you’ve forgotten, but I was kind of a brat to your parents. And your siblings.” An unwelcome flow of memories came trickling back at that, courtesy of Boscha’s amazing recollection for moments of personal shame. 

“Okay, so we were kind of little punks back then,” Skara admitted. “Still, it wasn’t that bad, was it?” Boscha looked at her friend incredulously. 

“Skar, I’m pretty sure I made Cadence cry about a dozen times. Remember that summer when she was dying to hang out with me ‘cause I’d just made Grudgby captain? I called her a loser kid or something and sent her off in tears, then laughed when you got mad about it. I’m pretty sure everyone in that house has some reason to remember me as ‘that jerk with the temper issues.’” Judging by Skara’s cringe of regret, Boscha was willing to bet she did remember that summer after all. Still, the bard had never been one to back down from an argument so easily. 

“Boscha, that was ages ago. Cady isn’t going to hold a grudge over something that happened when we were both kids,” Skara said soothingly. She pulled back on the reins, and Arietta turned off onto a side street as Boscha scowled. 

“That’s not the point,” she insisted. “I don’t want to just lean on your family’s goodwill again and assume it’ll all be fine. This is your sister’s special day, a memory she’ll look back on forever. Why would she want someone there who’s at best a stranger, at worst an unpleasant reminder? I’m not going to put myself in the middle of that just because I…” _don’t want this to end_. She managed to bite back on the admission, but only barely, and the whole thing still felt far too honest. 

The carriage stopped. Somehow, they were already there. The elaborate, gilded gate bearing the Harper crest stood before them, the mansion looming up behind it. 

“This is exactly why I want you to come, Boscha.” Now that Skara didn’t have to watch the road, she was able to turn the full force of her gaze on the baker. 

There was a reason why, after all these years, Boscha still thought of grey as a warm color. 

“The kid I went to high school with, or the Grudgby star I fell out of contact with… she wouldn’t have cared about something like intruding on another person’s happy memories. Wouldn’t have even though about it, honestly. But that isn’t you anymore, is it?” 

“I…” Damn it, this was not the time to be getting tongue-tied, but no one talked to Boscha like that anymore, honey sweet sincerity over a gentle smile. “No, I’d like to think I’m better than that now. But-” 

“Exactly!” Skara chirped, as bold about cutting her off as ever. “You’re not gonna make my sister cry at her wedding, are you?”

“No!” It wasn’t until Skara snorted at her that Boscha realized she had been joking. She didn’t have any convenient excuse to cover up her blush this time, either, so she just had to soldier on through it. “Look, I know I’m not the same person I used to be, but that’s not the point. The point is that there’s no reason for me to be at an engagement party where no one wants me there.”

Boscha sighed and unbuckled herself before picking up the pastry box. She always insisted on carrying her custom-made creations to the venue herself after one too many last minute disasters. 

“What if I want you there?” 

“Huh?” Boscha snapped her head up to stare at her friend, who looked at least a little panicked—although it took only seconds for that panic to resolve into steely determination.

“Boscha, I _miss_ you,” Skara said, her voice laced with the kind of open honesty that may as well have been its own school of magic. “I had no idea how much I missed you until I walked into that store and saw your grumpy face, but Titan, I miss you. I know things weren’t always the best back then—I’m not exactly proud of the way I treated people either, you know—but that doesn’t mean we didn’t have some good times, too. I…” Skara trailed off, her fire dying down to a more shy, almost hesitant look. Boscha stared, her face warm, daring not even to breathe. “I don’t want this to end,” Skara said softly. “And I don’t think you do, either.” 

“Fuck, Skar,” Boscha breathed, little more than a reverent whisper. The world outside their carriage may as well have vanished; she had eyes for nothing other than the witch before her. “Now how am I supposed to say no to that?” 

Boscha stepped out of the carriage quietly, the pastry box floating behind her with a spell keeping it perfectly level. Skara unhitched Arietta and gave her a few pats on the head before making her way around the side of the carriage. 

There was something in the air between them—a spark, a charge, something that could set the old, worn nostalgia they had alight in an instant. There was still the option to turn back. Boscha could give Skara her number, they could meet up again some other day. Somewhere with less of an audience, somewhere… 

Soft fingers interlaced with her own as Skara took Boscha’s hand and gave it a gentle squeeze. When she looked up at her, the hope budding in those smoke-warm eyes put Boscha’s final doubts to rest. 

“Missed you too, Skar.” 

Skara was never teased for showing up alone to a family gathering again. Showing up to her little sister’s engagement party hand in hand with a childhood crush, though… well, that was fair game.

**Author's Note:**

> thanks for reading! 
> 
> If you're interested in Skarscha as a whole, feel free to drop by [ this link](https://docs.google.com/document/d/1kreJHAjg7Igt9V5V0qS5UpuKjx-SongGUc6DFnOpbD8/edit?usp=sharing), we’re putting together a zine :D


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